Influence of Music

Throughout history society has been enchanted by music. Whether it is ritual, emotional release, religious, or just plainly relaxing to music has been at the center of our society. We use music to express ourselves, to tell stories, and let other into our thoughts. However, we often wonder if what we are saying has an effect on the listening audience. Recently, music references have been made to link violent and deviant behavior to music.

The key social issues likely to arise in the next twenty years due to violence and sexuality in today’s music are an increased in promiscuity in our society an increased in the crime rate, and decreased of respect among people. Music is perhaps one of the most influential forces we have encountered. Have many capabilities that have been since the beginning of time. Music is the most influential industry in the world, and it has the power to send messages to millions and provide an outlet for protest, generates billions of dollars, capture the attention of people all over the globe, and even holds the power to have positive effects on our mental health. But does is play too much a role in society?

Music plays much a role in today’s society. The degree of influence that music has is astounding. The mass media still have great influence over our lives; radio and television are still very influential. Television has showed us to untold number images of suffering, sexuality, and violence. Music can have a deep-rooted meaning to its listeners. It can change one perspective about life, or have a negative or positive outcome.

Children are one of the most impressionable human beings that walk on this green earth. They are at the stages where their identify is forming. This identity is affected by their environment, where a child mirrors one action. They start to notice how a person acts, whenever a person is polite, rude, and foul mouth.

The effect on music on children is truly astounding, as young boys are starting to view woman as sex objects. They feel as they have the freedom to be sexually aggressive to girls many studies have shown that the use of musical lyrics showed an increased in lenience in deviant behavior among young men and young woman. Studies showed that men have a more tolerant attitude, to what is violent and what is too far in sexual advances, which is the complete opposite to women, which have less tolerance. Studies have also found that heavy music and rap influence men’s towards women; examples are increase in men’s approval to rape myths. Such as she was dressing like she wanted it or she bought it on herself.

Woman’s view on this has completely changed among the years. Young woman are beginning to accept the idea that they engage in sex simply because they see it in music. Music video can also have a big affect on how people react towards society. Music video adds reinforcement to what is being heard, with the use of visual sense. Like Love the Way You Lie by Eminem, which shows a couple that act out domestic violence. “Love the Way You Lie” is yet another way to explore the darker side of relationships and question the values we see reflected in the entertainment industry.

According to the release of the GTA IV, (Grand thief Auto IV, for all the non-gamers), crime rates increased once again and guess that all the fingers has been pointed to. All fingers have been pointed to certain genres of music and films in which portrays violence. For all the nongame there, Grand thief Auto is a role playing game where players has to commit crimes including homicide, car theft, and drug dealing. Another example, most music contained lyrics that references to violence, sex, and drugs. Some lyrics are violent, such as Marilyn Manson: “Who says date rape isn’t fun, the housewife I beat, and I slit my teenage wrist. A further example is the music video for “The Way You Make Me Feel” by Michael Jackson, which portrays, a man stalking a woman who then become obsessed in his game of pursuit.

Youth are an impressionable bunch. Many young people are easily influence by everything, with games and music like these, there no telling what these young folks may do. Now many blame these types of games, music, and films for the deviant act that many people commit these days. With the newly release games and music, knife and gun crime escalating according to USA Today. With games that Manifest violence and the brutality in music lyrics, it’s easy to see how users mix reality with fantasy. Music is an influential force because people can relate to it; now imagine if violence goes hand in hand. Now it is an explosive combination, because these types of genres can change the way people can think. The escape from reality is important for sanity. All humans do it, in their own certain ways. Reality is pretty nasty, especially for people that have no power in their reality. But in music or video games, you’re strong enough to deal with it.

Respect is valuing each other in life. Now this word can be viewed, defined, or acted out in a variety of ways. But has this word “respect” deteriorated in today’s society or has it simply evolved into a word that society has manipulated the meaning of respect. Are we becoming an unruly society? Does the youth even care about the values of society? Has the moral values are degrading dramatically?

From recent stories everywhere, there is now disrespect for life in the world. From shooting to total respect, the world is evolving into a nasty being. All of this can be linked to the music we are listening. From the sagging pants to the baby mommas all can be related to music. One example is the deteriorating family values, such as an alarming increase in teen pregnancy. The lack of respect for teachers and people of authority is increasing as well. Song as Cop Killers with lyrics like: “I got my black shirt on, I got my black gloves on, I got my ski mask on, this sh*t been too long, I got my twelve gauge sawed off, I got my headlight turned off, I’m about to bust some shot off, I’m about to dust some cop off.” This song brought on a lot of disrespect, to actually listening to the lyrics made some people actually shoot police officers.

In this time period we are living in a role reversed society where kids are defining boundaries rather than their own parent teaching family values. There is no discipline for poor behavior. The word excuse has replaced accountability. There is hardly anyone holding the door for someone. But this is the norm of society, which I have observed.

Now music is in our mind from the beginning of our birth to our death. Music is an inseparable part of this world. We cannot live without music being a part of this world full of noise and beat. Let’s face it; society is very impressionable and vulnerable to music. With reality being harder and harder everyday and people needing to escape reality, it understandable that people relay on music to pull them up out of their funk.